Layout

Qarth is surrounded by three thick walls of thirty, forty, and fifty feet in height, respectively engraved with portraits of animals, war, and lovemaking.[5] The triple walls of Qarth is one of the nine wonders made by man reported in the book, Wonders Made by Man, by Lomas Longstrider.[12]

The buildings in Qarth are very colorful. Decorations include a bronze arch fashioned in the likeness of two snakes mating, their scales are delicate flakes of jade, obsidian and lapis lazuli. Slim towers stand tall, and elaborate fountains fill every square, wrought in the shapes of griffins and dragons and manticores. The balconies of the houses are delicate and frail.[5]

There is a great arcade where the heroes of the city stand atop columns of green and white marble. The statues are three times as big as a man.[5]

A cavernous building is home to a bazaar. A thousand gaily colored birds live on the latticework ceiling. On the terraced walls above stalls, trees and flowers bloom.[5] Also located in Qarth is the palace of Xaro Xhoan Daxos, which is larger than most market towns, and includes gardens, a marble bathing pool, a scrying tower and warlock's maze.[5] If one travels from the Hall of a Thousand Thrones to Xaro Xhoan Daxos’s palace, they pass the bazaar.[13]

Qarth possesses one of the greatest ports in the world.[15] It is a sheltered harbor full of colors, with large stone quays reserved for the ships of the various trade guilds. At the far end of the harbor are the quays where ships from the Summer Islands, Westeros, and the Nine Free Cities are allowed to dock. Near the port, winesinks, warehouses, gaming dens, cheap brothels, and temples to peculiar gods all cluster together.[15]

People

Descending from the Qaathi, Qartheen are a tall and pale people, called Milk Men by the Dothraki for their complexion.[5] They pride themselves on their sophistication and consider weeping in times of strong emotion to be a mark of civilization.[13] Qartheen politeness goes as far having the Qartheen guild of assassins known as the Sorrowful Men say "I'm so sorry" to their victim before killing them.[13][15]

The Qartheen dress in linen, samite and tiger fur. As per Qartheen fashion, women were Qartheen gowns, which leave one breast exposed.[5][13] Meanwhile, men favor beaded silk skirts. Warriors of Qarth wear scaled, copper armor and snouted-helms with copper tusks and long, black silk plumes and some of its guards ride camels. Children might go about naked, wearing only golden sandals and body paint.[5]

The Qartheen ride camels.[5][16] The riders wear scaled copper armor and snouted helms with copper tusks and long black silk plumes. They sit high on saddles inlaid with rubies and garnets. Their camels are dressed in blankets of a hundred different hues.[5]

Qartheen men and women retain their possessions after marriage. However, there is a marriage custom where, on the day of the wedding, the groom may ask for any one item from his bride's possessions and the bride may ask for any one item of the groom's possessions. Whatever is asked by either cannot be denied. This is seen as a gift of devotion by the bride and groom to each other.[13]

Trade goods from Qarth include saffron,[19] dreamwine and liquor, strongly spiced,[20] silk,[21][22] spices, and elephants.[22] Qartheen spice ships can be as big as palaces.[23] Qartheen ships travel as far as Braavos to trade.[24]

Qartheen adventurers search for gold, gems, and ivory along the eastern coasts of Sothoryos, hungry to make a profit. However, they have never been able to reach the southern end of Sothoryos.[25]

While Qarth depends upon its slaves,[17]khalasars never cross the Red Waste to sell their slaves at Qarth. The Qartheen do not want them to do so, either, as they strongly mislike the smell of the khalasars.[1]

History

Qarth claims to be the birthplace of civilization.[26] It is the sole surviving city-state established by the Qaathi people, who rose in the grasslands of central Essos — known today as the Dothraki sea — and founded city-states as they moved southeast following defeat in wars against the Sarnori.[27] Ancient Qarth was ruled by kings and queens, the ancestors of the Pureborn.[13]Jar Han, the eighth of the sea-green emperors of Yi Ti, exacted tribute from Qarth.[28]

Forced to look to the sea, the Pureborn who ruled Qarth swiftly constructed a fleet and took control of the Jade Gates, the strait between Qarth and Great Moraq. With the Valyrian fleet destroyed and Volantis focused on conquering the Free Cities of western Essos, no one opposed the Qartheen as they established their control over the most direct route between west and east, thus gaining immense wealth on both trade and levied tolls.[27]

In the second half of the first century after AC, the Qartheen pirate Xandarro Xhore travelled to the Basilisk Isles, which had been shunned for a century, and raised his banner there, erecting a grim black fort above his anchorage. Xandarro and his Brotherhood of Bones preyed upon merchantmen from there. His fort still stands today.[29]

A Clash of Kings

Three representatives of Qarth — Pyat Pree, Xaro Xhoan Daxos and Quaithe — accompany Jhogo back to Vaes Tolorro after he is sent by Daenerys to discover what lies near the abandoned city.[16] The emissaries escort Daenerys and her khalasar to Qarth. A column of camelry emerge from the city as Daenerys's honor guards upon her arrival. Upon entering Qarth, Daenerys thinks to herself that the magnificence of the city cannot be denied.[5] Her three young dragons are a marvel in the ancient city.[5][13][16]

Xaro Xhoan Daxos, a member of the merchant guild of the Thirteen, offers Daenerys the hospitality of his palace while she and her khalasar are in Qarth. Under his guidance Daenerys seeks an audience with the Pureborn to plea with them in the Hall of a Thousand Thrones for their fleet of galleys, or part of it and some of their soldiers. However, the Pureborn deny her.[13]

Xaro sees to it that the great and the humble alike offer some token to Daenerys, the Mother of Dragons. She receives gifts from throughout the known world, selling all except for a crown wrought in the shape of a three-headed dragon given to her by the Tourmaline Brotherhood.[13]

Daenerys is soon forced to flee Qarth after the Tourmaline Brotherhood, the Ancient Guild of Spicers and the Pureborn demand her expulsion and possible assassination after the destruction of the House of the Undying. Only Xaro's influence prevents the Thirteen from adding their voices to that of the other trade guilds and the city's rulers.[15]

A Feast For Crows

A Dance with Dragons

Xaro Xhoan Daxos arrives in Meereen as a representative of Qarth to visit Queen Daenerys Targaryen. He attempts to persuade her to sail for Westeros. Her campaign has disrupted the slave trade upon which depend many cities of Essos, including Qarth. He brings a gift of thirteen ships, stating that they are hers on the condition she sails from Slaver's Bay to Westeros. Daenerys has the thirteen ships Xaro brought inspected, but later refuses the offer. Xaro's reply is to leave a bloodstained glove on a satin pillow, indicating Qarth has declared war on her.[1]

Xaro leaves the thirteen ships at Slaver's Bay, where they give aid in closing off the bay to Meereen. Three Qartheen galleys sail up the Skahazadhan at night, in an attempt to close off the river as well. The Mother's Men loose flights of fire arrows at their sails and fling pots of burning pitch onto their decks, but the galleys manage to slip by quickly and succeed in closing off the river. The Qartheen further drive off a third of Meereen's fishing fleet, and manage to seize another third, leaving Meereen without trade.[17]

Besides the ships, Qarth sends a corps of Qartheen camelry to aid the Yunkai'i against Daenerys.[35]

Pale Qartheen are among those who come to Meereen to battle in Daznak's Pit.[36]

The Winds of Winter

Warning This information has thus far been released in a sample chapter for The Winds of Winter, and might therefore not be in finalized form. Keep in mind that the content as described below is still subject to change.

Quotes

Qarth is the greatest city that ever was or ever will be. It is the center of the world, the gate between north and south, the bridge between east and west, ancient beyond memory of man and so magnificent that Saathos the Wise put out his eyes after gazing upon Qarth for the first time, because he knew that all he saw thereafter should look squalid and ugly by comparison.[5]

Consider Qarth. In art, music, magic, trade, all that makes us more than beasts, Qarth sits above the rest of mankind as you sit at the summit of this pyramid ... but below, in place of bricks, the magnificence that is the Queen of Cities rests upon the backs of slaves.[1]